Passengers Carried on Aerial Trips and The Science of Aerial Navigation Taught under the Personal Supervision [of] Silas Christofferson...

San Francisco: Christofferson Aircraft Mfg. Co., (n. d.), circa 1912. 16 x 10.5 cm. Handbill, printed recto only. White stock printed in black. Long pencil notation to verso, presumably detailing a streetcar trip in San Francisco ("Up Market, down Van Ness -- [Outer?] zone -- down Zone. avenue to aviation field -- around field -- many pictures. Art stood all way"). Slight crease near one corner, else remarkably well-preserved. Very Good.

A rare promotional piece for Silas Christofferson and the Christofferson Aircraft Manufacturing Co., advertising aviation as "a safe and sane sport". Free exhibitions were offered daily "at the beach," presumably near the Christofferson hangar on Ocean Drive at Sloat Boulevard. Silas Christofferson was, with his brother Harry, one of the "early birds of aviation," and became known for such feats as flying in 1912 from the top of the Multnomah Building in Portland, Oregon, to the Vancouver barracks eight miles away. That year, both he and the Christofferson Aircraft Mfg. Co. set up shop in San Francisco, which is why we date this handbill to around that time. Christofferson died in a plane crash in 1916.